a BROADcast for Manufacturers

Read the article here: When will AI usher in a new era of manufacturing?

Lori: Not even getting into the AI component of this, but I was fascinated that this manufacturing process to create diapers. There's 40 separate loose streams to assemble per diaper.

Erin: Just that assembly line, and I'm sure there's a ton of automation within that already. And they're producing 1200 diapers a minute? In 140 different manufacturing lines globally? So when you're talking about data exactly, the amount of of data that they've captured. Exactly. And that's the other thing. They've invested in technology to be able to capture the data. That's step one, so they're not making assumptions. But the other thing that I found fascinating… As they did necessarily just take the raw data and throw it into AI, they actually created different simulated situations where there was an issue that occurred to identify it and try to be a little bit more proactive on how to minimize the downtime of their their machines.

Erin: If there's some way that we could operationalize the dissemination of learning so that the smaller folks have a chance to really exploit the learning that we're getting from AI. I think that'd be awesome. 

Lori: Yeah. I mean, I agree with that a hundred percent, and that would be the end goal. To some extent the R and D comes in at the cost of the larger companies and then finds efficiencies that can carry down to the smaller companies.

The article also had a case, which was Siemens, where the opportunity to support those smaller manufacturers as Siemens is actually using the products that they're selling that has AI built within their products. I thought that was kind of cool that they were, they didn't really specify exactly what it was that they were developing or building. But it's basically learning from the production lines, and then the machines themselves will be able to modify that the way that they're producing the equipment. To minimize mistakes and maximize production. So I think that's super cool, but also kind of like scary at the same time.

Lori: Everyone's got their own playgrounds or shared tools being used in the AI space. But a lot of organizations are just creating their own AI. So it's interesting. 

Erin: Yeah, it is. And I think that's one of the discussed implications of AI. Iit goes right back to the manufacturing model in the early phases of AI when it was funded as a public good. So the artificial intelligence systems were being built as research for the sake of knowledge, and that information was shared. It was public information in that era, and this is sort of unknown to us. I think largely that era has closed, and so now the market driven development is really the phase that we're in. But we closed the public good development era before, I think, we really reached for the stars with what we can do for the good of humanity and what we could do for the good of all economic drivers.

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Dayna Johnson is the Emerging Technology Programs and Operations Leader at GE Gas Power. She joined GE in 2012 as a commercial manager for high-voltage electrical substations and has held a variety of roles since then, including participating in the Accelerated Leadership Program. Prior to GE, she worked as a civil engineer, designing water and wastewater projects.

She holds a BS in Civil Engineering and a Master of Engineering Management from Valparaiso University, and she is a licensed professional engineer. She is also the immediate past president of the Society of Women Engineers.

What's the importance of diversity in this space?

We're sad that it's still not very common to have women engineers. And despite the fact that The Society of Women Engineers has been around for decades, we still are struggling to get women interested and excited in it. When we talk about what value diversity brings, you can go to all of the studies and say, “Oh, companies that have diverse boards, companies that have diverse fill-in-the-blank, have higher ROIs, they have better metrics.” Put all that aside.

Let's just peel back the onion and talk about this at a big level. When we start talking about things like getting a design team together and coming up with requirements. The example I always use, which is a little grim is crash test dummies designed to the average male height, size, et cetera, as a result, women are more likely to be seriously injured or killed in car accidents. But that's like worst-case scenario. It can be when you talk about a group of laborers using gardening tools. They had a left-handed person who struggled to use the tool because it was made for a person who was right-handed.

So when we talk diversity, it's not just gender or what you look like. So I think when I think about it as an engineer, way bigger than just pushing diversity for the sake of pushing it because it really truly makes our outcomes better and our products better.

What struggles do women experience in this industry?

Yeah. One of the big ones I think is just the bias, right?

I'll be frank, right? My first job was very old school dealing with utilities, dealing with the good old boys club. For lack of a better phrase, the old white guys, and their bias was to have people that look like them around. It's those barriers, right?

How do you figure out the ways that you can help people see that they can be there? How do you help people understand that? I think it's really hard for women to really be seen in some of the biases out there. People can Google and learn about the tightrope bias of how to not go too far one way or the other.

There are all sorts of issues with women who want to be a strong, confident woman. And so they act the way a man would. That doesn't really work the same in the industry, right? You get penalized for acting like a man would. 

Bias is one huge aspect, but you look across and this has been a very male-dominated field. And we talk about things like walking the shop floor. If you're on a job site, these are things that society hasn’t designed for women to be able to fit right into. So, when we talk about jobs where heavy lifting is required, you can say what you want, but stereotypically women can't lift as much as men. Or if we talk about even just being on the shop floor, safety gear is not as easy to find. So, when I was out in the field, out of college, I was trying to find long underwear because construction happens during the winter, right? Yeah. Women's long underwear is not created equal.

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Bill Fournet is Founder & CEO of The Persimmon Group, the award-winning management consulting firm he founded in 2004. Bill has been a project leader for more than 25 years in the IT, engineering, manufacturing, and business change areas. He has led or overseen large and mega projects in excess of $10 billion. Sometimes called “The Navigator of Chaos,” Bill loves to solve complex problems for organizations of all sizes. A popular keynote speaker, Bill believes “we are in the midst of a great transformation.” From technology to generational issues, Bill analyzes workforce trends to help you stay ahead in uncertain times.

He will deliver the keynote address at the Manufacturing First Conference in October, where he will share a hopeful and much-needed strategic perspective of the evolving workplace while equipping you with actions you can apply today to lead in a post-pandemic world.

As you were working with clients in the manufacturing field, and out with different speaking engagements, what leadership topics do you see rising to the top today?

I'm gonna put them kind of in three categories. The one that I would say has been the most recent, and probably one of the hottest areas of questions and concerns or challenges for leadership teams is the AI and robotics aspects. How's it going to affect their business, their site? How do they take advantage of it? But also, how does it potentially have long-term implications for that? And for me, the main focus around that one is around ethics. Is this the Jeff Goldblum quote from Jurassic Park? Just because we can do it, should we do it? And what are the potential effects it has for the manufacturer or the leadership team and for the labor force? The second is very much around the workforce. And really, in the workforce, it's been two areas. One has been most recent, which is the construction and the availability of labor. And the effects that that has on the business. But the broader one that I've been seeing for about the last 15 years has been the generational shift. And that can be everything from just the drivers and the expectations of the workforce, all the way through the technologies they want to use or maybe haven't used in the past. And then the last one, which has also been pretty recent. It seems like a lot of manufacturers are starting to settle in on this space, and that is around the supply chain and the inflationary impacts over the post-pandemic period coming out of that. How do they manage through these disruptions that could affect their logistics? Affect their supply chain? And how do they address that also in an inflationary economy?

How can manufacturing companies utilize disruptive moments to foster an inclusive environment that values and promotes the contributions of women leaders?

So my company, for example, is almost 75% female. It wasn't something I set out and was intentional in doing necessarily, at first. What I found was, it comes down to a couple of things. One is the openness to engage, where you may check your ego or baggage at the door. This means that in a lot of organizations, and this is a really interesting difference between the sports military side of the house, and the most corporate environments- in the sports in the military, they're very good at watching game film and talking about how to improve. Without getting their egos so caught up in taking it personally. Because we get what they do, they accept that we all make mistakes at times. And the question is, what do we learn from them? And we don't do that. We get very defensive, and then we start attacking each other. And we don't get to the point of actually solving the problem in an open way. And so on the inclusive aspect, especially with women leaders, is you got to start first with questions. And a lot of teams right now are moving so fast and feel like they're reacting to change. They're drawing conclusions instead of asking questions. I was very fortunate early on in my career at MTV, VH1 and Nickelodeon. Nickelodeon was almost 100% female management. And what I found was it’s a different feel or vibe in the culture. And part of it was because it was much more about asking questions. And so the way to increase your inclusivity, whether it's with women leaders, whether it's in diversity, whether it's in diversity of ideas, is you frame questions. As a leader, you say, “This is what I want to get the answer to, or what we want to achieve.” And you include people with their rank or title left at the door so that you can have an open dialogue. And then as a leader, you have to make a decision at times of which options you may want to take. But I think bringing in more people into the conversation early on, asking questions, and listening, to try to understand versus to respond, are great ways of dealing with this.

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Tato Corcoran was born & raised in the San Francisco Bay Area and spent the first decade of her professional career in Silicon Valley. At the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic, she started flipping homes & building a portfolio of rental units in Milwaukee. In 2022 she acquired Brandt Molded Marble, a sleepy manufacturing business on its way to extinction. Tato has spent the past year+ transforming that business into one worth owning.

You say [you acquired] a sleepy manufacturing business. Can you talk about that a little bit?

When COVID started, and I was here in Milwaukee, and I was still kind of going back and forth between Milwaukee and California. I still had my friends there and whatnot. But I was like, “Okay, now's the time.” What is it that I want to pursue? And it dawned on me one day that I could buy a house here, which you really can't do in California when you're 26. So I thought I'd make it an Airbnb. And so I bought my first house, and that led to an absolute real estate obsession. I ended up flipping, wholesaling, buying followable, I've probably done at least a couple of dozen real estate transactions and have a portfolio now that I've kept. But then it felt like the next natural step that I actually saw some of my peers pursuing was to buy a small business. And I'm sure you ladies are intimately familiar with a statistic about baby boomers retiring, it's like a daily rate of 10,000 or something like that. But essentially, no one has an exit plan. So I had some peers pursuing the acquisition of these businesses for very low dollars. And I thought I could do that. You basically have to be scrappy, resourceful and organized, right? I talked to 1,070,000 small business owners just to get a feel for what interested me. And I ended up I originally found this business near the middle of my search and it was broker listed at way too much. And I said to the broker that I don't know anything about manufacturing, so I can't even consider that. And then sure enough, a month or so went by and he called me and the owners were about 14 days from disclosing store and liquidating. So, turns out that [the former owners] had an owner operated business for 35 years. So very well established, and was absolutely an expert in this particular space. He is chemically speaking an expert on molded marble, and he was very active in the business. By the time that he was trying to sell, he was running a skeleton crew. They had their 12 customers who were super loyal to them, and vice versa. He knew exactly what top line, he needed it to put X dollars in his pocket and only need two people and only work 40 hours. And that was that, like he had it down to a science. And so it was sleepy in that it was just not growing.

How are you setting up Brandt Molded Marble to really find success as you move forward now that you have it?

[The former owner’s] existing customer base, which relatively speaking was quite small, was really strong. He serviced all of the main entry-level specs, single-family residential builders in the area. So again, while his top-line dollars were very underwhelming, I knew that his customers were super sticky like they weren't going anywhere. They dominate the spec space here, which again, is a really hot space. So I was like, “Okay, that's positive.” He had zero commercial customers. He also worked with like two general contractors to renovators. There are a bajillion renovation contractors within the Greater Milwaukee and Madison areas who are a perfect fit for the product, and vice versa. So massive opportunity there. So it was just a matter of (there were a lot of layers) to me taking this thing from something that was nothing to something. The first six months were sheer survival. I have never walked into something so blind and underprepared in my entire life. And I have no regrets at all. It's a blast now. 

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Mia is currently the Corporate Vice President-Service Manager, Board Member and minority owner of Uzelac Industries. She has worked at Uzelac Industries full-time for the past 3 years while handling the company’s marketing in her previous roles over the past 8 years. She has a strong background in Marketing, Advertising and Project Management. Most recently, she worked as a Project Manager at a Marketing and Creative Firm in Chicago for 4 years. As the Service Manager, Milena focuses on building up and organizing the service department to ensure all service projects flow seamlessly to meet and exceed our customers’ expectations.

Since it's been in your family, you've known this industry. Not only at [Uzelac Industries], but you've known this industry for throughout your whole life. Do you think that gives you a different perspective on what it's like to be a woman in manufacturing, given that you've seen it your whole life? And what is your experience as a woman in manufacturing?

So, my experience overall has been good. I would say there's plenty of meetings that I'm in, or places that I'm at, where I'm the only woman in the room. So, that's just definitely something to get used to. That's not the case in marketing. That is not something I didn't know going in, but you seems more apparent when you're there. But overall, going into like certain trade shows, things like that. I know that I've been told, “Oh, there's many more women here than there used to be,” which is nice. But there are some people that you can tell are surprised that I'm there at the manufacturing booth, and I'm not just the marketing girl and I need to talk through some things with them. I think that's just as long as you speak with confidence, like you're supposed to be there. I don't think that there's any hesitancy or issue with other people. I don't think anyone ever means anything by acting surprised to see. But that's just the reality of this situation. A long time ago, there were not a lot of women. I think, from what I've heard, there is a lot more now. And it's not just people's wives coming to conferences with them attending the conference and working there.

As you think about coming into your professional career, what are some of the challenges that you've faced? And if you have some advice to anybody who's taking that next step professionally? It doesn't have to be manufacturing specific.

Some of the challenges I faced, specifically coming out of college, it was a very saturated job market. When I was applying for jobs, it was very difficult to find a job in my field. So, I actually went into radio sales in Chicago. But that was my first job. I did radio sales and digital sales. And that actually was very helpful further along in my career. First of all, I do have a lot of respect for anybody that's in sales, it is not easy to do. So, it was definitely good to learn. Yes, but in my next job after that, when I was at the creative agency, we actually bought a lot of digital marketing. So, it was nice for me to be able to understand it. That's actually part of the reason they even hired me at that job as a project manager. So, I did move into my field after that, but I didn't find a job in my field right away. So, I would say don't be discouraged. It's really good to learn different things, and I would just look at it as a positive and what can you learn out of this situation instead of being discouraged. I wanted a job in marketing as a project manager, and I'm not going to accept any jobs otherwise. I think sometimes it's nice to really get your feet wet and learn some other things. And then I think, at the end of the day, even at this job, I still do the marketing as well. And we still have a digital marketing agency that I work with; we have monthly meetings go through things. It's nice to be able to understand it. So, even in my job today, my very first job that I didn't really feel had much to do with what I wanted to be doing is still applicable to me.

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Erin: Well, I'm in the process of learning is that has there Yeah, I in the process of learning. So, um, we all remember the left brain, right brain, you know, the left brain is the logical part of you and the right brain is the more poetic part. That's been dispelled a bit. This is not exactly correct. However, there are parts of the brain that do master some of these things that seem sort of beyond consciousness, you know, what your personality for example, you know, we've heard the examples of someone who will get have brain damage, and then their personality will train change dramatically. There are also many instances of where you know, a leisure or a lesion, excuse my leisure, a lesion, or some sort of injury will really impact language on one side of the brain or on the other. And I think those have led us to believe that like, oh, yeah, they're, they're super different. And the whole goal is to like, kind of get them to work together and it'll be supercharged. And I'm, I'm, I'm learning that that's a misunderstanding, but still wanting to explore. It's called lateralization. 

Lori: I mean, yeah, that's a very valid argument. And a lot of what I'm seeing in the marketing space, that as a marketer, if you are not leaning into AI, you're going to, you're going to fizzle out fairly quickly. I mean, it's changing the landscape. It's not replacing jobs, it's creating new jobs. And you have to learn how to use the tools to create efficiencies, so that, you know, we can produce more and I could go on this tangent for a very long time. But I would recommend, and I think there's an opportunity to look at, I have two points to share, look at AI outside of just the production line, and how it can be incorporated into other aspects of not just manufacturing, but any business. I think there are a lot of opportunities for creating efficiencies. But one area that I do believe can be extremely beneficial and it aligns with some of the case studies in the article here is, you know, the one thing that any business owner or business leader wants to do is make intelligent business decisions. And what AI is doing is helping to move that process along a lot faster. Because it's gathering the data which is what everyone needs in order to be confident in the decision that they're making. And the data is telling a story. And, you know, historically, we would just as humans spend a lot of time analyzing and digging through that, where AI is. It's doing that for us. And so it's allowing us to move faster and have more confidence in that intelligent business decision-making process.

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Loretta is a passionate advocate for language accessibility. As a business development manager, for Terra Translations a Milwaukee-based language services provider. She's on a mission to improve safety measures and equity for everyone involved in manufacturing and construction. She is born and raised in Wisconsin broad. Who has seen the positive impact of breaking down language barriers in her community both socially and professionally. Loretta is the proud mother of one and a half future linguists and holds a bachelor's and a master's degree from UW Milwaukee in translation and interpreting.

Loretta: Absolutely. So the United States is not monolingual and mono-cultural, as I mean, we all know that on some level, but it really can feel different because we get ourselves into our little pockets. You know, of course, if you don't speak English, natively, or fluently, you might feel more comfortable staying with people who speak your language better or might identify more with your culture. However, we all work together, and we all live together. And often it's in the same space. And if we don't have materials, such as training materials, specifically, my focus right now, in our native languages in a way that is meaningful to us, we're simply not getting the same access to that information. So language accessibility, means that regardless of your linguistic or cultural background, you have the same access to all the other information out there as your peers as your colleagues. And when it comes to safety and training materials, specifically in manufacturing and construction. There are real lives on the line and you know, there's a high risk of injury and even death in these jobs. So language accessibility could mean the difference between an individual's health and safety and really taking unnecessary risks.

Loretta: Well, I mean, you kind of said it right? In the question too, it really is an investment, there can be a sticker shock associated with it, especially if you're going to go from zero transaction to 100. It's a lot, especially if you're an established company, you have a lot of processes already in place. But the good news is, you do not need to go zero to 100, you can start with the teeniest tiniest baby step because personally, we are at terrible leave. The first step is the most important. So whether it is okay, let's take a look at what our materials are that our most important is our health and safety. Is it our you know, are there legal documents here, HR, what's going to have the most impact on our workforce or on our clients? What are our primary languages, maybe you want to start with Spanish, which is often the case in the United States, but then look into, for example, Hmong, Arabic, or any other languages that might be included in that. So it really comes down to prioritization if you are looking to dip your toes into the water before you really commit. But looking at it in the grand scheme of things, that investment is always going to be worthwhile for a few different reasons. One, again, the health and safety of your employees. I mean, from an altruistic standpoint, at the very least, of course, we all care about people's health and safety. And if they are getting materials in their native language, it is simply going to be a more practical plane is that. Second, you are leaving yourself open to a number of lawsuits in many industries. If you are not properly or not at all translating your materials into other languages. I'm talking, you know, HR departments, I'm talking medical documents, primarily financial, you really want to make sure that you cross your t's and dot your i's in that department. And you are also then opening yourself up to a more significant workforce as well a more talented a, you know, wider talent pool if you have your materials available in other languages. And if you are client-facing as well, you are possibly leaving money on the table if you're not reaching out to these new audiences who might respond to you better in a different language. So you have to look at the cost and what can we afford right now? What are the opportunities to explore in the future and where can we start today?

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Prashanth is the CTO at thought focus and leads the technology function across all business lines and customer engagements. With over 22 years of industry experience. Prashanth is spearheading the next wave of technology growth at thought focus, motivating teams to exceed customer expectations. He's a natural innovator with entrepreneurial flair. Prashanth is driven to architect new tools and strategies that bring together people processes and technology to solve complex business challenges. A trusted technology advisor both in-house and to third focus clients, Prashanth leads the development of innovative business solutions custom-built for client success. Prashanth entrepreneurial mindset has characterized his career, his technology leadership was integral to the success of two technology startups, which have gone into multimillion-dollar solution providers. Before joining thought focus Prashanth worked in key positions at Tech Mahindra and ces era software. 

Prashanth: That's such a great question only because AI seems to be the centerpiece of conversations for every single person on this planet today, who understands technology, or who connects with technology in some form or the other, right? And typically, whenever there are new technologies, there are always conversations at the beginning of the hype cycle where you think that technology is going to be a game changer, that technology is going to take away jobs, if you want to look at it from a different perspective, or that technology is going to change our lives so drastically that we've got all going to be in flying cars in two years. So, you know, AI has followed the same pattern in terms of human behavior and their analysis of a new technology that is being introduced, and they're getting to know this AI as a technology is not new, how we interact focus have been working on AI technologies for the last eight years. What has changed in the last, probably six months is that it has been democratized by the likes of tech GPT and others. There are also a couple of other technical improvements that have gone into AI models if you will, that have enabled this conversation that we are having, as well as other conversations that other people are having in either boardrooms or podcasts or just to friends on meeting across the table for coffee. It's changed the way people understand AI and look at AI as a practical solution. Because if you log into chat GPD and ask a question, you get an answer that is meaningful enough now that people understand that okay, this is a technology to reckon with, right? So, all right Just a baseline AI is a technology. That's where the conversations are. But primarily, the improvements in the models have resulted in enabling AI as a technology to solve meaningful problems for people or businesses. Asking a question and getting an answer is probably a relatively simple one. But what happens, especially if you take such generative models or transformer models than they do models or where your algorithms create new information or data for you? And when you take both of these algorithms or models, combine them and train them on large data sets, you get a really powerful computing and answering machine for you. And it's only up to the human imagination to figure out how to apply that technology. If your business and if you train those powerful models on a set of data that is within your sphere of business, then it becomes that much more efficient. They're called large language models, primarily because they are connecting information, words, data, and whole large space of the internet, if you will, or data spaces. So when you connect all that language, and words and meanings and everything else and get the context, what you can do with that information is beyond imagination at that point in time. And that is why this technology is a game changer. You know, in our lifetime, we have seen technologies that have become game changers internet was one of those fundamental aspects that allowed us to connect to each other in a virtual world. We're having this podcast today, because of the internet. And the internet was, was the hype. At one point, there were skeptics, they were people who said this will change the world. It didn't really change the world only because a lot of people said, Okay, this is how I want to connect. AI is, in my opinion going to be a similar technology where it allows people to connect to this sort of powerful platform in a way that our thinking or behavior or aspects of processing information and learning everything will change. And that will change businesses. So to answer the second part of your question, is it going to change jobs? Yes, it is going to change the way we conduct our jobs. It's not going to take away jobs, maybe but it is definitely going to change the way we all conduct businesses. So it is going to change our jobs in a certain way.

Prashanth: That's an interesting question. Because anyone and I feel when I predict technology, it gets obsolete immediately. It's just the nature of technology. Evolution is so fast that whatever you think is going to be the next big thing is already the thing of yesterday as such. But fundamentally, there are a couple of things that could be the flagpoles, if you will, in terms of where technologies are going to be the things of the future. If you look at the evolution of technology, and right from the day, when you had the mainframe computers today, with AI, all the conversations, deal with a couple of important things, the first and foremost data and converting that data to information that is actionable. And the way we process and analyze data, whether it's for business for humans, for people, whatever it is, it's changing. So from that standpoint, even if you take AI it is building context and intelligence on data. Some time ago, the whole big data conversation or data analytics conversation was also around that. So any technology that deals with making it easy to access information is going to be the key piece whether it is a visual aggregation of the information or gathering information from different sources or putting information into, a box, which is just a box, a magic box that you ask a question and you get an answer from sort of the thing, all of that. So the evolution of the next phase of technologies is going to be connecting the dots of this information and the other world becomes more connected. as our world becomes more and more active in sharing information. Today, information is very prevalent and available, the technologies that are better at doing that job and connecting the data and providing them with information are always going to be at the forefront. So that's why you talk about IoT, or connected factories, or self-driving cars, and all those things these days, because information about roads with the GPS system about all the things that are on the road with the camera, and that is all collated for you to have that self-driving car technology. So I think that's one of the flatboats. And today, that particular piece is around AI, data analytics, and visualization and all those aspects, right? The other technology, that is, again, a game changer is communication. Our communication has also kind of evolved, we're still communicating, I wouldn't say the same way, because I don't understand half the words that are used on the internet these days, and to say, all, but it's just very different. And the slags are very different and all of those pieces, but the way to communicate has evolved as well with the convenience of communication. And most people like to text rather than pick up the phone and call people these days because it's convenient to text. And similarly, that piece when you're communicating, it's whether it's with people, with the system, or with the world around you, that is also a place where it is going to change. The reason why Apple thought it was a good idea to release the VR technology right now is because they think that is going to be a good platform for the world's information to be collected and presented. And for you to communicate through that device. At this point in time. I'm a little, I would say skeptical about how efficient that will be right now. But I know that is the future in terms of how we interact. Even today, when you look at training, let's say for example, a machine operator or a maintenance worker, that technology is in use today because it all relays information to the real world so well that you can communicate in that device in terms of what is happening around you and with somebody in your ear talking you through what needs to be done all those pieces, right? So information and communication are always going to be the centerpiece of what technology does to the business to the world if you will, and those technologies are going to continue to evolve. And if you want to do anything in this space, those are the two areas I would say, Be focused on and bring that together.

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He is the VP of Marketing and global digital strategy. He has experience working with the various departments that make Grasshopper unique in the industry as a family-owned company with in-house marketing, in-house manufacturing, final assembly, and post-sale parts inventory. Daily, he works with a team to expand upon Grasshopper's decades of performance as a dependable brand to continue sharing the company's story, promoting the dynamic product, and supporting authorized retailers throughout North America and international markets. Trent leads the company's e-commerce strategy for continued growth and to enforce its solid reputation for supporting its customer base of owners including large acreage, residential, commercial, and municipal users.

Trent: As far as the turf equipment, you know, we're not there's no IoT yet. There, it's still relatively against us that the word analog, is a pretty simple concept, as far as that goes. And we've had, we've entered a lot of data over the years, but we've spent so much time entering it and a little less time analyzing it. And so we've flipped that a bit recently, where we're, you know, historically, we're making a lot of gut decisions because we were so and not because that's all we did, but we were so developing a company, we were so involved with our not only our retailers, our dealers but also our end users. So we really, it was like analytics without having numbers in front of you, I suppose. So we had a lot of good feelings from lots of conversations with people. As we've had to scale up over the years, just as our business has grown, that's a bit harder to have all those conversations. Sure. And so we've started relying a lot more on analytics. As far as e-commerce, we were getting ready to do a b2b. And then we'll phase into a b2b website for orders. But right now, we dipped our toes the last two and a half years into Amazon. And so we started there, the analytics that has provided has been incredible, you know, to be able to look at just yesterday, I was studying our fast moving parts, and it mirrors pretty close, like what we would suggest a dealer stock. But there's a few things that indicate otherwise, maybe, and that might tell you that, oh, this is a part that maybe Where's more than we acknowledged or thought of, or something. And so it's given us a lot of insight there. It's also told us where our customers are, and maybe where our dealers aren't, in some cases. You know, in Amazon, we found that the average drive time, to study this for the first quarter of all of our Amazon sales, and the average drive time, one way was like 45 minutes to get to a dealer. And so that's why they're buying on Amazon. Yes. And, and two-thirds of the of the orders came after hours, whether that was in the evening, or on the weekend that a dealer might not be open. So we learned a lot of things there that have helped us either adjust some things in our day-to-day business or proved that this was an important endeavor to follow.

Trent: I think more so the latter. And I think the reason we might have the drive time is so long is that you know when you've been manufacturing this equipment for about 50 years, we've been a manufacturer about 65, we did some grain equipment before that. And we've been doing the mowers for about 50. Plus, when you've had equipment out there that long, and it's up, it's instead of just a piece of equipment a resellable asset. So either in times of tough economy, people will maybe buy parts repair rather than to buy new, but also our equipment is built to I mean, that's one of our taglines first to finish built to last. And that's a true statement. I mean, these pieces of equipment, it's not unheard of that we'll have somebody who wants to buy parts for a 25 to a 35-year-old piece of equipment. So over those years, you know, your dealers may come and go in some of those areas. So there's some distance there. So that's showed us hey, we need to pay a sales rep. It needs to go target some areas and get some representation in there so we can support those customers.

Trent: Yeah, that's an interesting one. So I don't know, I'm big into the weather. So I'm a significant bit of a weather geek. So I've got a folder on my iPhone screen, and it's on my front screen. So it's easy to access weather apps. And it's, it's not maybe unheard of, to maybe spend $100 A year subscription for something because, around Kansas, things move through here pretty quick. And so we like to have the best radar and the outlooks and the and knowing the flow of everything, and so on my son's baseball team have become known as the local weatherman. And so they always consult me they, they think it's cloudy, and they say, oh, it's going to rain. And then they asked me and I said, No, no, it's fine. It should be good till the end of the game. So I don't know I kind of geek out over that stuff a bit. And I think that's just part of when you're living in Kansas. And you always feel like, often you're under the gun and especially this time of year in the spring when there might be a tornado. Yeah, you asked me this question. And it took it it was I was hard pressed to. I don't find some of this may be interesting, but I still share it. Anyway. I, I learned all the words too. We Didn't Start the Fire by Billy Joel. And when I was probably a preteen. And maybe that was kind of dorky or whatever. And so I remember it. At my sister-in-law's wedding, that song came up and I started singing it and nobody else did. And I look around I thought I read I read fun. Everybody knew this song.

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Nikki is an accomplished innovation leader with over 17 years in the chemical industry. She has held various roles as an individual contributor, manager, and senior executive leader. She holds a BS in chemistry from UW Whitewater, an MS in chemistry from UW Madison, and Executive MBA from our IT, which is consistently ranked as a top 10 school by US News and World Report. I didn't know Alrighty, so that's good to know. So, in 2018, she was named top 40 nationwide MBA students by poets and quants. So this woman is incredible and really smart and we're so happy to have her here. With the companies, she has worked for. She has developed a unique way of managing scientists that have helped the team she has led into being high performance, developing novel innovations. receiving multiple recognitions. Nikki is the founder and president of Knievel, she founded this company to help develop cultures of Innovation Excellence by teaching companies and scientists, the technical and professional skills that would help them reach their highest potential, and essentially, to innovate row in Excel. 

Nicki: I think the biggest thing, which has helped me is having a frame of reference so as peanut Christina was saying, you know, now that we have more work talking about more, and we could see other women who have led this journey for us, we can start to see like oh, okay, since she has done it, You can do it well. So it is for me, I think. And one of the things that I love, what I do is, when I see other females who are either demotivated, they've lost them, their passion they're in the ignition is to, to talk to other females who may either have already done it or are successful, and try to understand from their journey, what did they do? How are they successful, what worked, what didn't work? And once we can get those frames of references, we can start filtering them and say, Ah, okay, so she tried this. And that worked. So maybe I could do the same. I could try it and see what works. And so I encourage women and all sorts of people to find frames of reference, and talk to other people and learn about their journey, what worked, what didn't work, but also read and watch movies. I think those are all great ways to give us the inspiration to help us move forward.

Nicki: I still feel there is room to grow but I do feel we have progressed quite a bit. And where I feel we've progressed more and more is we are taking a little bit more and how our personal, emotional, and mental state has a lot to do with how we perform in life. And this is something I highly encourage a lot of people to do is to get to know who we are as people, what are our strengths, and what are our values, and once we can understand that, then we can take that and do just a whole host of insurmountable things. So Well, I still think that there are a lot of areas for us to get into and grow and, and still progress. Progress as a society, I do feel that compared to 20 years ago, we are talking about it more, we're embracing, you know, the vulnerability side of things. And we're taking time to think through who we are as people. And rather than subscribing to the patterns that society or our environments tell us that we need to follow, we are starting to think through well, does this pattern fit me? And if not, how should I rewrite this pattern? And I think there's more and more, more and more people talking about it and embracing that. And I think that's, that's cool because there are so many great things we can do once we get to know who we are as people.

Nicki: Yeah. So it's funny because when I meet people for whatever reason, they think this serious, stoic, always playing-by-the-rules type of person. So for example, in my, my MBA curriculum, my cohort, called me Miss TCB, which was nicknamed Miss taking care of Business. But what they don't realize is there's a mischievous and spontaneous streak about me that when I get into the right environment, I will do that. So for example, growing up on a farm, I saw all these adults taking this what looks like a rolled up paper, and inside it was like stuffed grass, or what it looked like stuffed grass, and then they would, they would light it up. And I was curious because they were blowing up rings, the smoke and they were just laughing and giggling and I was just like, that is so cool. I don't want to do that. And so I asked to try and they looked at me and like oh no, no little girl you can't try this. So again, the error is me being curious and I want to try it and it was a challenge for me. I thought maybe I should just go and make my own. So I went to my mom's you know, garden and I took her garden hose and I started stuffing it with grass clippings that we came up with a lot more and I just lit it up. 

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